Author: Steven Sahiounie

It is crucial that Muslim nations continue their united efforts for a lasting cease-fire in Gaza, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan told his Egyptian counterpart on Wednesday. In a phone call, Erdogan and Abdel Fattah al-Sisi discussed Israel’s aggression against Palestinian territories, as well as efforts to deliver humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip, according to a statemen by the Turkish Communications Directorate. “During the meeting, President Erdogan stated that it is important for Islamic countries to continue efforts initiated to ensure a permanent cease-fire in unity,” the statement added. It also noted that the Turkish president conveyed his good…

The UN Security Council decided to postpone until Thursday, December 21, the vote on the draft humanitarian resolution of the Arab countries in order to agree on its wording, Ecuador’s permanent representative to the UN, Jose de la Gasca, told reporters. “The Security Council has agreed to continue negotiations today to allow for additional time for diplomacy. And the presidency will schedule the adoption for tomorrow morning,” he said late on Wednesday. Ecuador chairs the UN Security Council in December. The countries are now having “very high discussions” to “reach a text that will in fact be adopted,” said Lana…

Lana Nusseibeh says that she has faith in the diplomatic negotiations that are taking place at the UN, after it was reported that an expected council vote was delayed for the third time. “Everyone wants to see a resolution that has impact and is implementable on the ground, and there are some discussions going on on how to make that possible,” she told reporters in New York. “In another sense, if this fails, then we will continue to keep trying, because we have to keep trying because there is too much suffering on ground for the council to continue to…

Daniel Hagari says Israel’s ground invasion and aerial bombardment of the Gaza Strip will not stop unless the Israeli government calls for an end to the military offensive. “We will continue our strikes on Rafah to target Hamas leaders,” the Israeli army spokesperson said. “Our goal is to dismantle Hamas and to have no military body threaten us.” The army will also keep targeting Hezbollah positions and fighters, he added. “Returning the kidnapped people is one of the goals of the war, and we will make every effort to return them,” Hagari said. Source: alJazeera

The French president Macron made the comment during a wide-ranging interview with the France 5 broadcaster. “We cannot let the idea take root that an efficient fight against terrorism implies to flatten Gaza or attack civilian populations indiscriminately,” he said. He called on Israel “to stop this response because it is not appropriate, because all lives are worth the same and we defend them”. While acknowledging “Israel’s right to defend itself and fight terror”, Macron said France called for the protection of civilians and “a truce leading to a humanitarian ceasefire”. Macron was one of the first Western leaders to…

Israel’s military has said its warplanes have struck another Hezbollah position in southern Lebanon. That came after Hezbollah today said it had targeted Israeli positions near Beit Hillel and Shtula. Israel’s military also said it fired at fighters near a perimeter fence in the area of Metula. In another incident, Israel said it returned fire after four launches from Syria were detected in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights area. Source: ALJazeera

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that justice will prevail both in the Ukrainian conflict and in the Middle East. “We have talked about the fact that both in the case of Ukraine and in the Middle East there is a tendency when the US considers itself entitled to usurp, monopolize any foreign policy processes, as a result of which it brings devastation, undermines statehood, as it happened with the same Libya, causing hundreds of thousands of civilian casualties, decline in the socio-economic sphere and huge flows of refugees to this or that region. <…> In this sense, the nature…

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ruled out the prospect of any ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, which has been the subject of a genocidal war by the occupying regime for the past 75 days. The regime began the war on October 7 following an operation staged by Gaza’s resistance movements, during which hundreds were taken captive. More than 20,000 people, most of them women and children, have been killed since the onset of the Israeli military campaign. In a statement on Wednesday, Netanyahu said the regime “won’t stop fighting until we’ve achieved all the objectives we’ve set ourselves.” He…

discuss a potential new Gaza truce

The leader of the Yemeni Ansarullah resistance movement says the country’s armed forces will not hesitate to target US military warships in the Red Sea if Washington and its allies carry out military strikes against Yemen. Sayyed Abdul-Malik al-Houthi made the remarks in a televised speech broadcast live from the Yemeni capital city of Sana’a on Wednesday evening. He underscored that Yemeni forces will start firing cruise missiles at US military vessels should the newly formed maritime task force in the Red Sea take a hostile action or strike Yemen. The Ansarullah chief also advised member countries of the coalition not to sacrifice their own security…